Ted Cruz: Obama is forcing Americans to ‘submit’ to him by banning anti-Muslim speech

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) delivered a video address to a gathering hosted by anti-Muslim conspiracy theorist Frank Gaffney, in which the Iowa Republican frontrunner warned that President Barack Obama had outlawed criticism of Islam.

Cruz defended his host, who has gained some recent notoriety thanks to Trump’s calls to ban Muslims, and claimed the Obama administration had moved to ban the type of hate speech Gaffney traffics in, reported Right Wing Watch.

“Frank Gaffney has been attacked over and over again for having the courage to stand up and speak the name ‘radical Islamic terrorism’ of the enemy that is waging jihad against us,” Cruz said.

The Republican senator is fond of attacking the president for not saying the words “radical Islamic terrorism” in that order, which seems to be a signal that Obama may be a radical Islamic terrorist himself.

Cruz has previously warned that Democratic lawmakers would “repeal the First Amendment” — and he told another whopper about an alleged plot to limit free speech.

Attorney General Loretta Lynch told a Muslim group recently that the Justice Department would “take action” when rhetoric against Muslims “edges towards violence” — but she later clarified that federal authorities “prosecute deeds and not words.”

Cruz casually lied that Lynch had imposed a “ban on anti-Muslim rhetoric, what she considers rhetoric against radical Islamic terrorists.”

He warned Islamophobic attendees that Obama would use the ban to force Americans to “submit” to his administration.

The presidential candidate and junior Texas senator laid some of the blame for the San Bernardino shootings on the supposed ban, saying it had a “chilling effect” on a neighbor who said he did not report his suspicions about the Muslim couple because he did not want to racially profile them.

Lynch made her remarks in response to anti-Muslim sentiment in the wake of those fatal shootings.